Blog-piece: By Mr Peter Perrin
“Margaret Thatcher, her death regrettable her political life unforgettable?”
WHENEVER I saw Margaret Thatcher in full flow at the “dispatch box” during “Questions to the Prime Minister” I was always reminded of a painting by John Opie titled “Boadicia Haranguing the Britons” which portrays a redoubtable woman in a man’s world. The imperious image of Queen Boadicia looking down upon her all male audience conjures up, for me, an impression of what it must have been like for members of her all male cabinet. The comparison to Boadicia is reinforced by the sobriquet “The Iron Lady” and the belligerency portrayed in the statue of Mrs Thatcher in the House of Commons i.e. the stabbing pointing finger. It is said by some of her colleagues that “she loved a fight”, but there are times when aggression is counter-productive and divisive, maybe it was her penchant to pick a fight that spawned her divisive political instincts and gave rise to her being perceived by many as the epitome of the “divide and rule” ethos which she ruthlessly practiced..
I do not intend on this blog to comment in detail on Mrs Thatcher’s policies, about which a lot has already been said, suffice to say there were some good, some bad and some vindictive. However, I do think it appropriate to mention her attitude to the people made redundant as a consequence of her policy to close coalmines and other manufacturing industries.
One can agree or disagree about the justification of the decision for closure but one cannot forget or forgive her lack of compassion and sympathy for the hardships and suffering caused to the thousands of workers and their families thrown onto the “scrapheap” of unemployment with no thought or effort made by her government to the creation of alternative industries and training as a means of providing paid work. She callously abandoned those people and then cynically went on a publicity seeking solo “walkabout” in a derelict area talking about re-generation with no plans and little enthusiasm as to how to achieve it. It was this lack of compassion or sympathy that exposed the cynicism and hypocrisy of her quoting St Francis of Assisi on the steps of No 10 “Where there is discord may there be harmony” when she and her government thrived, encouraged and prospered on discord.
Mrs Thatcher was an ambiguous personality, she was, without equivocation, either loved or hated. However, it does not excuse the behaviour of those celebrating her death in the unseemly manner witnessed on our television screens. You do not have to eulogize her, admire her or even like her, but I believe she is entitled to respect and magnanimity at this time and the feelings of her family should also be respected. That said, the criticism of the celebrations by the likes of the Prime Minister, David Cameron, is devalued when one recalls he travelled to Libya to celebrate the overthrow and death of Colonel Ghadaffi.
There is a saying that “It is harder for a rich person to pass through the gates of Heaven than it is for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle”. I hope that Mrs Thatcher, when she arrives at those gates, will be judged accordingly and God will be compassionate in his judgement.
Peter, a good piece this. I am one of those that think Mrs Thatcher was, with a few reservations, a good thing for the country and has been unfairly maligned over some of the big issues of her time. However, it is refreshing to read something that, whilst critical, is respectful and thoughtful. Far better than the ranting bile that is most often seen and heard. It’s rare to hear a reasoned argument from the left these days.
Mr Perrin I am sure you have made some very sound points but should have gone further I for one do not believe people in this country should be burdened with the cost of £10 million pounds for the privilege of burying Margaret Thatcher, I think it is an insult to the majority of the working people of this country, I feel this has been demonstrated quite clearly in news coverage all over the UK
The farcical thing which annoys me is the Tory party assassinated and knifed her in the back at the end of her career and now they spout about her great leadership
I think you will find especially in the North of this country no tears will be lost for her and quite rightly so
When you consider there are old people in this country trying to get by in their day-to-day lives and when they lose a loved one the anguish they must go through to scrape together the cost of a funeral it makes me sick
Her family are reportedly worth £62 million net do they really need helping out by the UK taxpayer?
Albert, she won three General Elections, two of them with pretty big majorities. Kind of disproves your ‘…insult to the majority of working people in this country’ line. Also, you will find that those that knifed her in the back have gone very quiet lately. Like her or Loathe her, she was one of the great Prime Minister’s, probably the last one that actually did things rather than talk about doing things, a malaise that has affected PM’s from John Major up to and including David Cameron.
Gray 64 when I said the majority of working people I was indicating the poll over the weekend the outcome of which 64% thought it was wrong to have to stump up for the funeral incidentally £5 million worth will be spent on security for the expected hostilities
And nevertheless it was her own party whether the individuals are quite or not now
As for your comment about doing things I can remember the things she done scum that she was
Why don’t you comment on the 321 lives she took when the Falklands war was going on and she had the general Belgrano sunk why was outside the exclusion zone to win an election or have you forgotten about that that is without the millions of lives she ruined in this country
I also note your lack of comment on the 10 million taxpayers are being robbed of to pay for this sham
Albert, you have totally vindicated my first post. Unintelligent, abusive bilge, that’s what your comments are. If you are going to comment on anybody, at least make sure you know what you are talking about. In wartime, any enemy assett is a legitimate target, it doesn’t matter where that assett is at the time. To think otherwise is to think wrongly. It is on record that the Argentinian Naval commanders at the time, and since, have said that the Belgrano sinking was a legitimate act of war.
As for the rest of your badly written post, I was taking the same line as Peter Perrin and not going into policies, as he said “I do not intend on this blog to comment in detail on Mrs Thatcher’s policies…” I was intending to follow his lead.
Gray so when we discussed Margaret Thatcher let us forget all the horrendous things that she had done
Margaret Thatcher, the “Iron Lady” of Britain who adamantly defended and praised her friend, former Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet for “bringing democracy to Chile,” died following a stroke on Monday. She was 87.
1977 – Set up Mark Thatcher Racing.
1982 – His mother launched a major international rescue mission when he got lost for six days in the Saharan desert during the Paris-Dakar rally.
1985 – Was alleged to have made commission on the al-Yamamah arms contract between British Aerospace and Saudi Arabia. The contract had been signed by his mother.
1998 – His company is investigated over allegations of loan shark operations.
2005 – Fined $500,000 and given a four-year suspended sentence in South Africa after involvement in an attempt to overthrow the government of Equatorial Guinea. His mother paid his £167,000 bail to free him from house arrest along with his fine.
By the way he pleaded guilty
Fruit doesn’t fall far from the tree, and the British taxpayer has to pay 10 million for this, are you having a tin bath
Albert, so now you accuse the mother for the sins of the son? Ridiculous. Mind you, I suppose you have led a blame free, fault free life so are entitled to cast the first stone? No? One thing that does interest me about this Thatcher hatred, what did she do to affect you personally? What one of her policies had a direct influence on your life that cast such a bad pall over it that you have never been the same since? I have asked a relative of mine who is rabidly anti Thatcher and, when it came to it, he couldn’t come up with anything that directly affected him and he’s a born and bred Mancunian.
Albert, do you really believe everything you read in the press? £10m is a vastly overstated figure, but I think Baroness Thatcher does deserve a Civic send-off. I do believe that she did not draw all her prime ministeral salary during her terms in power though, so perhaps she is paying for some of it herself.
Firstly Gray you have selected amnesia you again forgot to mention the Chilean dictator Pinochet
The point of why I mentioned Mark Thatcher was because it is quite clear by her actions she condoned what her son did by bailing him out of all the situations he got in to as for me leading a blame free life, I am not having a £10 million pound state funeral and saying I’m the best thing since sliced bread, and as far as comparing her with Winston Churchill which is the latest old toffee I have heard absolutely ridiculous
• Chickenfeed do you think she had to when her alcoholic husband Denis, incidentally another great person to look up to sat on the boards of 60 different companies, why don’t we privatise her funeral that’s what she would have wanted
• Margaret Thatcher completely and utterly un-defendable
So, when it comes to it, and when he is asked directly, Albert cannot come up with anything that Lady Thatcher did that affected him so personally and so badly that it has caused his deep seated hatred of her. And, once again Albert, I am not getting into the pro’s and con’s of the woman because it’s a bit of a pointless debate to have. Clearly, she divides opinion and I won’t say anything to make you change your mind and it’s unlikely you could say anything to change mine. After all, isn’t that what politicians all do, divide opinion? I was hoping for a reasoned debate, of the kind started by Mr Perrin but all you spout are lists things you say you find objectionable about the lady.
For my part, the Thatcher years were great years. My parents were able to buy their council house and, because Dad felt that times were getting better after the 70’s decided to try his luck at self employment. He did really well and, in the early eighties we went on our first foreign holiday and we had a good few more after the first. I started work, after college, in 1983 and did well. I had a good few jobs but was always employed and did OK. I carried on through the eighties having a great time. So you see, from my point of view, the Thatcher years were among the best of my adult life. All the stuff about policies and the right’s and wrong’s of some of the things she set in motion just didn’t affect me which is why I am interested in hearing why people from down this part of the world hate her so much. And before you say it Albert, yes I was aware of the poll tax riots and the miner’s strike etc etc but, as I have said, they just didn’t affect me personally.
Most people on the left of politics despised her a number of reasons.
She completely smashed the post-war consensus.
She went on and on about aspiration rather than wanting people to stagnate – or kept in their place.
She had a good economic mind. Those on the left tend to take a Mickey Mouse view of economics where their figures never quite add up.
She wanted people to work hard and thought people in private enterprise deserved the financial rewards that came with hard work. She would not have stood for the banking culture nowadays.
She exposed the hypocritial nature of many on the left (however i will stress not all lefties are hypocrites!)
She was a woman
She crushed the unions, closed mines (although Wilson closed more than her in the 60s) and made millions unemployed. Before 1979 I think it was reported that the UK was as close to ‘full employment’ as a country could get. However this was due to the State subsiding companies which were failing and uncompetitive with the rest of the world. Even so they hate her for this and attribute all the blame on her.
She took school milk away (They forget this was also started by Mr Wilson in the late 60s)
She was fiercely patriotic. Something the left pair with racism and/or prejudice.
She had the gall to allow working class people to buy their council homes. How dare she!
I have no idea why she was voted in three times (and I believe she would have won in 1992 had she hung on) if she was so awful?
Thank you, I’m glad you have summed it all up because nothing this woman done affected you personally in your book she is okay, I’m all right Jack, unlike you Gray I originally come from one of those towns in the north that is why me and my families and friends perspective of Margaret Thatcher are completely different to your own I suggest you walk in somebody else’s shoes before you make wide and assuming comments
But if you are comfortable with your personal reasons for defending this person and everybody else can go to hell for putting forward their views I think it just shows what a true Tory heart and soul you have
I strongly suggest you go up north sometime and see the places Margaret Thatcher completely decimated whilst you were having it so good but again what does that matter to you, I will give you a tip if you go up north I strongly suggest you do not publicly voice your comments feelings are still running strong in that part of the country
Oh dear, Albert. You really don’t get it do you? You really don’t. Somebody else help me out here, I am trying to get a dialogue going but I keep banging my head against the brick wall that is Albert!
Albert, for the last time of trying! I am trying to fathom what Mrs Thatcher did to affect you, and others like you, so much that you hate her with such a passion. I am not talking about her well known policy calls or her well known successes or failures. I am trying to get to the bottom of the hatred. My post was attempting to demonstrate that I can’t hate her because nothing she did affected either myself or my family. It was in no way intended as an “I’m alright Jack” statement.
As I said a couple of posts ago, I have family up North and I have broached this subject up there. The haters always trot out the usual lefty anti Mrs T propaganda (and much of it is propaganda) but, when pushed to define something she did that drastically made their lives worse, can’t come up with anything concrete.
So Albert, I put it to you once more. What did Mrs Thatcher do to you personally that made your life so bad you’ve hated her ever since? It’s a valid question I think.
I do not understand why, just because her policies do not have a direct impact on you personally, you are not allowed to show disapproval bordering on hatred.
Yesterdays bomb in the Boston marathon did not have a direct impact on me, so according to your logic, the perpetrators should be given a state funeral at the tax payers expense?
Before you say the two things are not connected, just think of the number of lives she has personally destroyed due to her policies – it may well have been kinder to blow them all up…
Gray I have persevered for some hours to express mine and my family’s experience at the hands of Mrs Thatcher’s policies and the effect it had on me particularly, please do not feel this is a copout because after deliberating and explain my own personal views and putting them down on paper there is no way of doing so without giving away much personal information of which I am not willing to do I do hope you take that to be the truth, it’s very hard to express all the things that happened to my family whilst she was at number 10 and would have little meaning to yourself without knowing the personal facts
The Doove, stupid last sentence. Albert, fair enough.
Are you in denial about the number of lives she has quite literally destroyed? If that is the case, then you are no better than those who deny that the Holocaust ever took place. Nuff said.
I rarely get offended by Posts here but, The Doove, you have managed to do that with your moronic and repugnant accusation in your second post. Thank the heavens that the majority of people on this planet are not as stupid as you.
The Doove thank you for your support and your blogs thanks also for the fair enough comment from Gray , I still stand by my comments about Margaret Thatcher nevertheless